Saturday, March 13, 2010

I managed to see the Art Ensemble of Chicago last weekend at International House in Philadelphia, and they were simply stunning in the depth, wit & beauty of their music. I House had sold every seat in the house, plus maybe 20 more, as people sat along the steps up through the rows of seating. The current line-up consists of founder Roscoe Mitchell on saxophones, drummer Famoudou Don Moye (plus a second percussionist sitting in whose name I did not catch), Hugh Ragin on trumpets & William Parker on bass & stringed African instruments. If it doesn’t take your breath away, you’re not breathing.

Other Books in Print

Memoirs & Collaborations

Criticism

Anthology

Ron Silliman was born in Pasco, Washington, although his parents stayed there just long enough for his mother to learn that one could step on field mice while walking barefoot through the snow to the outhouse, and for his father to walk away from a plane crash while smuggling alcohol into a dry county. Silliman has written and edited over 30 books, most recently Revelator from BookThug, and had his poetry and criticism translated into 14 languages. Silliman was a 2012 Kelly Writers House Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania, and the 2010 recipient of the Levinson Prize,from the Poetry Foundation. His sculpture Poetry (Bury Neon) is permanently on display in the transit center of Bury, Lancashire, and he has a plaque in the walk dedicated to poetry in his home town of Berkeley, although he now lives in Chester County, PA. In 2015, Silliman taught at Haverford College & theUniversity of Pennsylvania & was writer in residenceat the Gloucester Writers Center.